Jon Sumrall hit the right notes in his first week as Florida Gators head coach

Jon Sumrall’s only misstep so far in Gainesville might be sartorial. On a day when Job 1 was convincing the Gator fan base that this G5 head coach from Louisiana was very much not the same as the last G5 coach from Louisiana, he wore a blue suit and orange tie with a grid-like pattern to his introductory press conference very reminiscent of the the outfit that Billy Napier wore to his first press conference.

That, and a reference to Lane Kiffin early in his opening statement that went over like a lead balloon, are about it for miscues. As soon as Sumrall got to talking about his philosophy and intentions as Florida’s head coach, most concerns about the new boss being the same as the old boss melted away.

I’ll admit, the written statement from Sumrall upon the announcement of his hiring set up a warning bell to me. The use of an exclamation point in the part that went “at Florida, having an explosive offense isn’t optional – it’s mandatory!” felt like a lady doth protest too much kind of deal. For those of you who aren’t semiprofessional writers, exclamation points are not typically used in corporate communication of this kind, so it suggests someone might’ve been trying too hard to make a point.

But when it came to addressing the offense during his introductory press conference, Sumrall hit the bullseye. It was good that he went beyond platitudes like “aggressive” and “explosive” and got to talking about things like mixing tempos — something that’s been missing in Gainesville since, what, the Meyer tenure? — and “threatening every blade of grass”, which Napier’s football-in-a-phone-booth scheme never did.

Critically for me, he name-checked Bob Stoops as the kind of defensive head coach he wants to be. From Day 1 at Oklahoma, Stoops was so committed to running an offense that opposing defenses would hate that he hired Mike Leach away from Kentucky to be his offensive coordinator in 1999. Yes: it was Stoops, a former defensive coordinator, who was Patient Zero for the Air Raid’s eventual takeover of the Big 12. He disliked defending against the Wildcats while at Florida, so he wanted to inflict the same pain on his new conference rivals.

Sumrall followed through on those threats by hiring offensive coordinator Buster Faulkner away from Georgia Tech. Faulkner too is from the Air Raid tree, having played for and been a grad assistant to Chris Hatcher at Valdosta State and then an assistant for him for a year at Murray State. Hatcher played quarterback for Hal Mumme and Mike Leach running the earliest form of the Air Raid at VSU in the early ’90s and has always run a pretty pure form of that scheme through his career. If Hatcher’s name sounds familiar, it’s because there was coverage here and elsewhere about Napier’s OC-in-title-only Russ Callaway having been an assistant for Hatcher at Murray State and Samford.

I will cover Faulkner’s history in depth at another time, but he has that Air Raid pedigree without an aversion to running the ball. He ran offenses both at Middle Tennessee State more than a decade ago as well as recently at Georgia Tech that rushed more than they passed. He also ran offenses at Middle, Arkansas State, and Southern Miss that passed as much or more than they rushed. He’s adaptable, in other words, and his tenure in Atlanta marked him as a rising star in the profession.

These factors are a noticeable departure from the last defensive head coach Florida hired, Will Muschamp. At his introductory press conference, he made it clear he wanted a “pro-style offense”, meaning the kind of scheme that spread offenses were rapidly replacing around the country, and preferred offensive “balance”. I put that word in scare quotes because it was clear from ensuing comments that nearly all he cared about was not passing too much.

Now, Muschamp also said, “you’ve got to be able to make the defense defend the field 53 and a third yards wide and 120 yards deep.” That’s pretty similar to Sumrall’s “every blade of grass” statement, although it’s not clear to me why an offense would want to make sure a defense is defending the the offense’s own end zone. Words are just words. But Muschamp’s fixation on pro-style offense during what was still the upswing of the spread era — RPOs hadn’t even become prominent yet — showed that his mindset about offense was out of date. Sumrall’s hiring Faulkner is forward-looking whereas Muschamp’s hire of Charlie Weis was decidedly and intentionally backwards-looking.

Sumrall also impressed, if he didn’t surprise, with his defensive coordinator hire of Brad White. The two had worked together at Kentucky under Mark Stoops, and White’s defenses were among the best bang for the talent buck until recently. The fall off coincided with advent of the NIL era, and you can probably guess which sport Big Blue prioritized most with their dollars.

On paper, it’s the best set of coordinator hires since Jim McElwain also brought in an established guy on his side of the ball and an up-and-comer on the other. It’s up to Sumrall and White to make sure their specialty works better than McElwain’s and Doug Nussmeier’s did.

Sumrall also did a good job at keeping Florida’s 2026 signing class together. Only a couple of prior commits went elsewhere, and one of them was a lower rated tight end who may or may not have been wanted by the new staff. While it’s a testament to the unity of the players that they stuck together during the uncertain period after Napier’s firing, they just as easily could’ve collectively decided to say farewell to each other had they heard something they didn’t like from their new head coach. Instead, Sumrall largely kept the band together despite some fierce competition for key players like Davian Groce down the stretch.

A good first week and five dollars will almost get you a peppermint mocha at Starbucks this time of year, and there have been coaches who ultimately failed at UF who seemed to get off on the right foot. Sumrall will sink or swim based on fall Saturdays, but the foundation he’s laid this week looks strong. The next big test will be the transfer portal window, and there are a lot of internal evaluations and revenue share haggling to go on between now and then.

A lot of Gator fans were disappointed a week ago when it became clear that the school was not going to hire Kiffin. Sumrall knew he had something of an uphill climb to change that narrative, with his joke a nod to that fact, but he managed to do it. He’s officially been the head coach all of six days and has two good coordinators and a fairly good transitional class (by transitional class standards) in the barn. He’s also made it clear through word and deed that he’s a new kind of character and not a repeat of any of the recent head coaches who’ve swung and missed in Gainesville. Given the state of play not that long ago, those are big wins for the new boss in town.